Waves W43 Noise Reduction

Noise is a huge pain. I'm a metal guitarist, and it's the number one issue I always deal with in a mix. Nothing is perfect when it comes to taking out all string noise and amp hiss, but there are certain noise reduction units that are better than others. The Waves W43 is one of the better ones out there. There are five total sliders -- threshold, low, low mid, high mid and high. By adjusting these five different sliders, you can dial out most of the noise you want to get rid of in your mix. It's a super simple to use VST that anybody can utilize without ever having to read the manual. Personally, I never read it so I couldn't tell you how effective the actual manual is at explaining things. There's really not much to explain, however.

SUITABILITY/PERFORMANCE

Waves rules when it comes to things like stability and performance. I never experienced a single crash or mishap while using this plugin, and I've used quite a few instances of it inside a DAW before. These plugins are just rock solid. The VST plugin is also cross platform compatible. That means that it can work on both OS X and Windows machines without any issues whatsoever. As a Mac user, that makes me extremely happy. There is one issue, albeit a minor one. The plugin is a 32 bit plugin. I run a 64 bit DAW, and to use this, I need to allow Logic to use a bridge application that can run 32 bit plugins inside a 64 bit DAW. While it's not a huge deal, it would be nice if they updated this to 64 bit sometime in the near future.

OVERALL OPINION

The plugin is good, and I've used it quite a bit. It's way more versatile than most other noise reduction plugins out there, and you can dial in exactly how you want to get rid of the noise. However, I usually find myself just using the standard Logic noise reduction unit. It's just a bit easier for me to stick with the standard Logic plugins for things like noise, adaptive limiters and a few other things where I don't need to do tons of tone shaping. Experiment with it and see how you like it. Granted, it comes with the Mercury bundle, so I hope you'll be trying out every single one of these considering the cost we had to pay...